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“Hey, Dairy Queen.”
Strong Sad pouted. He would have certainly written in his blog about this rebirth of his ill-considered moniker if Strong Bad hadn’t conspired with the Cheat to hack in and change his password to something he would never guess. (It was DairyQueen1.) “I made a mistake!”
“The first time,” Strong Bad snorted. “Second time is like… permanent marker. In my brain. Like, it’s frozen in, from brain freeze, ‘cause you’re all about the blizzard.”
“I am not a snowstorm with sustained 35 mile-per-hour winds!”
“Uh, yeah, no, butt for brains. Your Blizzard is less of the 'low-pressure' kind and more like the 'your head with some Butterfingers unevenly distributed inside' kind, Dairy Queen.”
“That’s it, say it again!”
“Nah, too much effort. I’ll just call you DQ. Anyway, I came in to tell you that I’m not going to lock you in the bathtub this year for Decemberween.”
“You’re not?” Strong Sad’s voice was full of hope and wonder. “You mean I get to celebrate Decemberween this year? With presents and hot jones and-“
“Uh, let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Let’s just say the Cheat and I have some last minute shopping to do." The Cheat concurred, and he and Strong Bad sauntered out of the room with a mischievous purpose.
Strong Sad turned off his dreary public television special and sat on the couch, stunned. His eyes glistened with touched joy, shining over a mouth with unusually upturned corners. (The smile was barely present, but it was as far as Strong Sad could push it without needing to take to his bed.) Inspired, he hopped off of the couch and toddled upstairs to his room.
At first, he reached for his memory box, but he pushed it back under his bed. These were going to be new memories.
Then, he reached for his poetry book. It was heavy with downtrodden verses and loathsome moaning, which was his idea of the holiday spirit. But, again, he put the item aside. The poetry book was for escaping, even if writing long, tragic verses about his ill-fated existence jingled his bells like nobody’s business. He was going to live in the moment. He was going to live!
With a flourish, he plopped down at his writing desk and whipped out paper, pen, and an ink well. The inspiration came to him immediately:
The Best Decemberween Ever
A Holiday RPF by S. Sad
“Uh, I don’t think you want to be writing that, Strong Sad.”
Strong Sad twisted around to find Homestar Runner hanging around the corner of the doorframe into his room. His torso slouched down. “Homestar,” he whined, “how do you get in here?”
“I’m bringing back Strong Bad’s sewing machine. I made Marzipan a dress for Christmas.”
“You made a dress for Marzipan?” Why hadn’t he thought of that?
“Yeah! Bubs is getting back into the hamburger business, but he’s trying to be all organza about it. Y’know, raising his own beef, grindin’ it up! It's gonna make a great dress.”
“A hamburger dress?”
“Nah, I already ate. Anyway, he had these leftover cow clothes, and they’re all spotty-looking. Spotty is all the trend this year, one of the hot colors. Not like purple. Or red. Nobody wears those anymore. Sooooo.... I think Marzipan is gonna love it. Oh yeah.”
Strong Sad was already hiding his head in his hands. “And what does this have to do with my story?”
“Oh, right. Yeah, Strong Sad, I kinda already had the best Decemeberween ever a few years ago, and I sort of don’t want to repeat it. I got Strong Bad that DVD he loves again, because I saw he threw it out when I was looking in his trash for my pants-“
“You don’t wear pants!”
“Long pants, long pants, long pants!” Homestar bounced around the room madly.
“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH! I can’t take it anymore!” Strong Sad toddled out of his bedroom and all the way out of the house. It was snowing outside. He skidded to a stop in the quiet night. “Decemberween snow,” he sighed.
“Aw, man!” Strong Bad dropped a bundle onto the ground and marched up to his baby brother. “What are you doing out here, dork squad? How I am going to get my stuff into the house with your gigantic body in the way, McSkulker?”
“I was just-“
“Get in the house! I have to find some trash bags for your gifts.”
Gifts! His first Decemberween gifts from Strong Bad! What would they be, he wondered? He was tempted to lean over…
“No peeking! Get in the house! Go…” Strong Bad mumbled, searching for an activity. “ Go wash your elephant feet. Who knows, might be crying bunny slippers in here…”
“All right!” Strong Sad dashed into the house as quickly as his heaving body could take him and went into the bathroom. “Ah, old sanitary station! I shall finally be keeping other company this year.” He hummed to himself while he set up the Epsom salt bath for his soolnds. He wanted them to be soft and wonderful for those weeping bunnies! He plunked his feet into the little tub and sighed with something like happiness.
Suddenly, something seemed wrong to Strong Sad. He had tried to swirl the water with his soolnds, but they wouldn’t move. It was almost as if they were…
Out of nowhere came a triumphant cackle. “GLUE! Hahaha!”
“But… you said...”
“Yeah, I said I wasn’t going to lock you in the bathtub. This year, I glued your elephant feet down. Hahaha! You didn’t see it coming! Ah, you’re so stupid…” Strong Bad’s voice rolled with laughter as he left the bathroom to attend to his Decemberween celebration: falling asleep on the couch.
In the bathroom, Strong Sad sighed. He should have known it was too good to be true. His brothers had never been nice to him before. Nobody was nice to him. Why would they start now? No, he was destined to spend each and every Decemberween attached to a bathtub – alone.
Later, when the tears dried, he looked glumly over at the window. He could see it was still snowing outside. If he leaned, he could even see the Decemberween lights on all the other houses in Free Country U.S.A., twinkling like stars in the silent night. It was quite beautiful. He wished he could be part of it somehow.
Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted something that had not been there before. Balanced on the edge of the sink was his poetry book and two pens. They were newfangled pens, the kind that didn’t need an inkwell, but they would do the job! He leaned with all his might and just managed to pull the entire bundle into his lap.
But how…?
“Oh yeah, Strong Sad?” It was Homestar again.
“What?”
“Uh, do you know where your polarity book is? Strong Bad wanted me to put it in your bathroom with some pens from that drive through place with the whale, but I can’t find it anywhere, so can I just go? I’m going to wrap Marzipan’s dress up in some plastic. Marzipan loves plastic.”
“Yeah,” Strong Sad replied quietly, staring at the pens. They both had blue whales printed on the sides. “Yeah, go ahead.” He clutched the book to his round chest. “And Homestar? Happy Decemberween.”
“It’s Decemberween again already? Oh no, I gotta get something for Marizpan!” Homestar bolted for the door, running into Strong Bad on the way.
“Aww, man! Not you again! I thought I told you to get out!”
“Strong Bad, I gotta go buy Marizpan something for Decemberween! It’s here again already, and I only have last year’s prese- wait a minute!” he grumbled. “That lying no-goody! It can’t be Decemberween. Strong Sad’s not locked in the bathtub!”
“No man, it’s Decemberween all right. I’m … uh… yeah, I’m just gonna do it later…ish… almost… maybe not.”
“Great plan, wrestleman. Santaman? Hmm-hmm? Oh, right! Gotta go! Happy Decemberween!”
Upstairs, softly, the poet was at work…
The Most Tolerable Decemberween Ever
By S. Sad